Purdue University Senate

The Purdue University Senate is taking additional actions to scrutinize the school’s decision to purchase online educator Kaplan University.

At the Senate’s first meeting of the academic year Monday, members announced creation of a special committee to serve as a fact-finding body about the deal and Vice Provost for Teaching and Learning Frank Dooley took almost 20 minutes of questions about the agreement.

A group of Purdue professors is getting ready to study whether grades have risen artificially in the last 30 years.

Agriculture professor Levon Esters and math professor Ralph Kaufmann, agree with President Mitch Daniels that the issue deserves consideration if Purdue wants to maintain a reputation for rigor.

“If you have a Purdue education, it means something. If you got an A here, it means something,” Kaufmann says. “It’s not like at other Universities where 40-percent of the grades are A’s, so it doesn’t mean that much.”

As he completed his final meeting as chair of the University Senate, Purdue professor Kirk Alter chided Provost Deba Dutta and administrators who sit in the Senate for acting on their own behalf, but under the guise of representing the rank-and-file in their departments.

On this Monthly Conversation with Mitch Daniels, we ask Purdue’s president if the line has become too blurred between faculty and staff and whether those administrators are wolves in sheep's clothing.

The issue of free speech on a college campus has already been tested at Purdue in 2016.

From anti-abortion protestors using fiery rhetoric in an effort to rile up passersby to a University employee posting threats of rape on social media, the newly-adopted “Chicago principles” of free speech have been tested almost to their limits.

On this month’s conversation with Purdue President Mitch Daniels, we ask if the school put itself in a tough spot by advocating for expanded freedom of expression.

On Monday, the Purdue Faculty Senate heard an impassioned and tearful resolution from chemical engineering professor Steve Beaudoin asking the school to include better treatment for people with autism-spectrum disorders in its health plan.

When President Mitch Daniels announced the change would be made, a cheer went up from a dozen assembled supporters and Beaudoin thrust his fist in the air at the prospect of ending what’s been a two-year long fight for him and his family.

WBAA’s Stan Jastrzebski interviewed Beaudoin shortly after he made his emotional speech.